There was no shortage of non-floral businesses trying to capitalize on the traditional floral holiday of Mother’s Day this year, including Smith & Wesson trying to convince buyers in a bright, flower-embellished print advertisement that what mom really wants is a nine-millimeter pistol. But despite all the competition, the floral industry appears to have been effective at maintaining its sales figures for Mother’s Day.

Although the final numbers are still being tabulated, the early results indicate that Mother’s Day 2015 was a success. Rita Peters, assistant vice president of floral at Hy-Vee stores in Des Moines, IA, told The Produce News that it was “terrific — our best Mother’s Day ever. Many stores sold way over their projection.” She attributed the results to “good ad items, favorable weather and a lot of planning. Peters’ comments on planning were echoed by Liane Mast, floral director at Stater Bros. in California. She told The Produce News, “The key to a successful floral holiday or event, is to talk it up at store level, have the management team on board with a plan for space for the displays, the labor to receive, merchandise, care and maintenance of the product and of course give great customer service.” Mast said Stater Bros. experienced “a 12.45 percent increase over last year’s Mother’s Day week.”

This supermarket floral department was fully stocked with beautiful bouquets, plants and balloons and was ready for Mother’s Day shoppers.In parts of the country with large Hispanic populations, the timing of Mother’s Day had an effect on holiday sales. Mother’s Day in Mexico is celebrated on May 10 every year, regardless of the day of the week. One supermarket executive, located in the southwest, noted that Mexican Mother’s Day falling on the same day as the U.S. Mother’s Day this year did hurt its stores located in heavily Hispanic-populated areas, creating customer counts behind last year. Those stores’ floral departments normally have two sales spikes — one on the 10th and another one on the U.S. Mother’s Day. Mast also mentioned that sales lagged well behind on Saturday this year compared to last year, which was May 10 in 2014. “But we made it all up and then some on Sunday,” Mast said. “The stores were buzzing all day.”

Garden center sales were also strong for Mother’s Day this year. Sue DeMuth, manager of floral merchandising, Heartland Region, at SpartanNash in Edina, MN, told The Produce News, “Garden center sales were up, especially in the Midwest regions. With the warm spring weather our garden centers were very busy, but as the weather got cold and cloudy on Sunday, customers came inside and bought roses, bouquets, arrangements, blooming and green plants. Sunday we were up from 2014.” But not everywhere had great holiday weather. One group of SpartanNash stores in Rapid City, SD, got hit with 12 inches of snow and “it just shut them down.”

However, most supermarket floral departments reported very few problems for such a large and important holiday. Mast told The Produce News, “We didn’t have any problems this year, it went remarkably smoothly, with the exception of our rose supplier — we had to move some dates around to accommodate his rose deliveries from his supplier.” Another supermarket floral executive also commented that there were some quality problems, but overall quality and arrivals were good.

On the supplier side, it was also a strong holiday. Frank Biddle at Tradewinds International told The Produce News, “Mother’s Day was a very good holiday for us, up over 34 percent from a good holiday last year.” But it was a mixed bag. “There was a relative scarcity of flowers, bottlenecks in Miami distribution, air shipments went pretty smoothly but labor was very tight,” Biddle said. “Too many people aiming to ship on the same days caused problems with box handlers in Miami as well as difficulties for trucking companies getting loaded and on the road.”

Comments from other shippers and wholesalers indicated that transportation from South America was a problem. Shlomo Danieli, owner at Blooming of Beloit in Beloit, WI, told The Produce News, “I had a shipment from Medellin [Colombia] that arrived in Miami on Friday, May 1 and it was still waiting to get shipped out to me on Tuesday, May 2.” And Lee Spence, president at Koehler & Dramm Wholesale Florist in Minneapolis, told The Produce News the Miami shipping was the worst he could remember for a Mother’s Day. “There were a lot of delayed and missed shipments, so it was hard to keep track of everything,” Spence said.

Most California growers contacted considered it a positive holiday. Robert Kitayama, president at Kitayama Bros. in Watsonville, CA, told The Produce News, “The holiday was good — we were up a little over last year. We were a little low on production on some products but we were able to sell everything at good prices so that made up for quantity.” In Carpinteria, CA, Linda Giovannozzi, director of business development at B-Fresh Floral told The Produce News, “It was a successful holiday with good sell-through for our customers. We planned on a 10 percent increase and made sure we allowed for substitutions if necessary; we actually had approximately 15 percent increase this year.”

So all-around Mother’s Day 2015 was a strong and successful holiday for the floral industry, but in the words of B-Fresh’s Giovannozzi, “Our challenge is selling during the non-holiday weeks. It’s relatively easy to sell flowers during the busy holiday weeks. Let’s promote flowers in July and August.”